The other day I was driving home up the hill from the Spit on Kachemak Drive. The elderly lady we always see with her bicycle on Ocean Drive, Spit Road and Kachemak Drive was walking her bicycle up the steep hill on Kachemak Drive. 

She was about two feet from the edge of the road, because there is no shoulder along Kachemak Drive. She was just below the crest of the hill, where you can’t see oncoming traffic coming from East End Road.  

I slowed way down to follow her until I got to the top of the hill to see oncoming traffic. A large four-wheel drive truck came barreling up behind me, and I was afraid he might run into me and knock me into the bicyclist.  Fortunately he slammed on his brakes, and then he and I and three other cars behind him slowly crept up to the top of the hill to where we could see oncoming traffic and get around the bicyclist safely. 

It’s time to build a safe pedestrian trail along Kachemak Drive connecting Spit Road to East End Road. The local non-profit group, HAT, Homer Area Trails, has been working on this project; the Parks Recreation and Beaches Commission had a committee working on this before that. 

There is an existing trail up the hill on the Mud Bay side. Homer Area Trails has cleared enough brush that it’s walkable now. Please use it. Hopefully this is just the start of a complete bicycle and pedestrian trail all along Kachemak Drive. 

The city wants the state to pay for it. Obviously the state has no money. HAT has suggested that the trail could be continued using volunteer local labor with city trails funds (funds currently sitting unused) for materials. 

Will it take somebody getting killed on Kachemak Drive to make this project happen?

Bumppo Bremicker